Lies for the Liars
by love.strawberries
Summary: A collection of oneshots inspired by songs the the latest album from the Used, Lies for the Liars. Different pairings, mostly slash, but some het. NOT SONG FICS.
1. Liar, Liar

"_Father touched you with the hand of God  
__He's gripping tighter"_

Isshin knew it was wrong. He knew it was wrong in the way that his toes curled and his breathing hitched in his throat. He knew it was wrong in the way that he felt like he was flying, soaring, crashing back down to earth in a series of never ending tumbles and yells. Yes, he knew it was wrong, but he also knew he'd _never_ stop.

Not with Ichigo panting, pushing back against him, calling his name in soft little pants that almost never reached his ears. Not with Ichigo's head handing down, his mess of too-bright hair changing his face into a mask of shadows and unfamiliarity. Not with the way his hands tightened of their own will, forcing –_but not forcing, never forcing_- Ichigo higher, longer, hotter.

When it was over, it was always over, he would fade back into his nest of commonplace occurrences and familial duties, and Ichigo would leave again for his destiny, his life, his place in the world that endlessly fought him. And everything they did, everything they danced around, everything they remembered when their eyes connected at the dinner table, would be just a lie of the senses.

* * *

song: "Liar, Liar (Burn in Hell)"  
pairing: Isshin and Ichigo


	2. The Bird and the Worm

"_Out of his mind, the weight pushes him whispering  
__Must have been out of his mind  
__Midday delusions of pushing this out of his head, maybe out of his mind  
__All he knows if he can't relieve it it grows and so it goes"_

He doesn't say anything. He never says anything, not during these times. In these times, while the sun is long gone as the moon seems to shine endlessly, his weapons aren't his sharp, mocking words. His weapons are skin and sanity… Or loss of.

He comes like a slither, a ghost, a hiss escaped from clenched teeth and tightened lips. His whole self, his essence, makes everything that is _not_ him irrelevant and imperfect. In his purist beauty, he is Life Incarnate.

You wish him away, because what else can you do? If you acknowledge him, he'll _consume_ you. He'll _become_ you. You will no longer be "you"; you will be "you" and "him". You will be a "we", and you can't stand that thought. So as his colder-then-they-should-be hands rum downs your sides and rests on your hips, you wish him away. But you know that even that whispered wish isn't at all honest. If he was gone from you, the loss would be something incomprehensible. So you don't try.

He's cold against your warmth. He presses down into you, makes you disappear from being. His touches inspire fire that can never be quite felt.

This is maddening, maddening.

And he's taking you, and you're biting your lip, except not really, because he doesn't exist, and you don't exist, it's only the moon that makes the colors spin in your mind and – oh god, you're burning alive but he's cool, always cold and this can't be real because he isn't there-

And you open your eyes. Nothing's there save you and the ghost of touches. The sun is just rising, the sky almost blood-red in its rebirth. His voice, his ever-present and silent voice floats through your mind in an all too familiar way.

_King, you're going crazy._

And you think that maybe, for once, you agree with him.

* * *

song: "The Bird and the Worm"  
pairing: Ichigo and Hollow Ichigo


	3. Smother Me

"_Warm and alive, I'm all over you  
__Would you smother me?"_

He's everything I am not. Everything that I dream about at night, but cast away in the morning. He is warmth. Pure heat, burning souls and bodies alike. E uses that warmth so carelessly…. No, he doesn't _use_ it at all, because he isn't aware that he has such a power within him… Within him, in his skin, lingering in his clothes. He isn't aware that I know him better then anything I've ever known in my life.

I watch him now as he so thoughtlessly griped with the other squad members, playfully shoving an elbow, an arm in their shoulders. He laughs, he frowns, he pouts, he leers. He is life. I envy him that he looks warm. Everything with him is tan skin and fire hair and blank inky lines that are still brighter then anything I've ever seen.

I wonder what he thinks about. I wonder what's going on in his mind right at his time, as he's watching me watch him.

He actually manages to startle me as seemingly instantly, he's left the conversation of his comrades and found his way to my side.

"Captain…" He gives me his little deferential nod, the closest he's ever come to a bow. He doesn't _bow_. And after months of silent arguing, it is the one concession I allow him in front of others.

I look him over. "Renji… Have you finished the paper work you received?"

I try not to stare so obviously at his lips as he opens his mouth to speak, his posture shifting into easy familiarity as he spoke in a soft voice reserved only for me. "Yes, I have, Captain. Took fuc- forever-" he amends with a quick nod in apology, "but I finished in time. I've sent it off."

He suffocates me with his voice and the look in his eyes that catches me still. How can he look at me so wantonly, and still manage to hide it from the others? Maybe it's the light ever-present in them. They mask that look of fire and heat.

Surly, such a look would be easily detected on my own face, where emotions are not the norm. My fingers itch to clasp him to me, to bring his careless red hair to my throat and suffocate myself with its length; just to see if there is life yet within me.

"Captain?" A touch to my shoulder makes my eyes jerk up to his, and he almost flinches, because I never show my surprise, and yet that's what he's done, he's startled me because e distracts me as easily as a soft-spoke word distracts him. "Captain?" Again, his voice soft and careful.

"Renji… You'll come tonight?" I don't look at him as I speak, I look _through_ him, because that's where he truly is, embedded in flesh and bone as a flame that will never end.

The smile he gives me takes my breath away, causes all rational though to leave my mind, causes me to choke a little more on the smoke that wafts from him.

He doesn't reply in words, he doesn't have to. Instead, quicker then anyone could ever imagine of him, a single hand closes over my throat, a caress of fingers and a tightening of muscles, and then he's gone.

Oh yes, he's going to kill me one day, he going to smother me with the brightness of his eyes and the fire of his mouth.

* * *

song: "Smother Me"  
pairing: Renji and Byakuya


End file.
